The movie begins and ends with pretentious pictures and an ominous music ,that show a tendency to make the viewer feel he's going to watch (or has been watching) an "important " "meaningful" "deep" work. The worst of it is ,one suspects that the director ,Pierre Zucca ,actually believes he's made a genuine sleeper,and does not know,has no idea at all that it's the bland and hackneyed bourgeois/hoodlum love affair it actually seems to me. The videos and those mysterious moves across Paris town may remind the highbrow of those Jacques Rivette's interminable wanderings where there are strange conspiracies (or is it only imaginary?)
The Nouvelle vague strikes again twenty years after! A heady psychological drama (Who said headache?) meets thriller : who are those boys who meet on the streets ,updating the" wild ones"?: are they drug -trafficking???are they prostitutes for the well-off bourgeois who supposedly love leather coats? And the heroine's father ,is he a cop ? Or is he the head of this organization ?
In the grand tradition of the notorious NV ,the film drags on , and the best actors of the lot , Philippe Léotard and Victoria Abril, are given poor parts ,the former disappears after 5 minutes only to reappear one hour later ,and he is sorely missed .
The principals are mediocre ;Léotard's daughter Leatitia 's namby pamby acting gets on your nerves in the long run :she's got excuses: it was her debut (and thankfully only film). Her friend /lover , played by the director's son -it's all kept in the family indeed!- is totally bland ,and when he tries to be menacing,he would not scare a four-year-old. Fabrice Luccchini ,badly directed, gives an affected performance ,in a rather self-conscious manner.
An old French folk song ,"il était un petit navire ",the last verse of which hints at the "youngest sailor eaten when there's shortage of supplies "; Zucca would continue in this vein for his follow-up "alouette je te plumerai" , based on the French-Canadian song:at least there was humor in it (and Chabrol actor) ,thus more palatable for the mainstream ; "rouge-gorge"" and "Vincent mit l'âne dans le pré (et s'en vint dans l'autre)"should be reserved for intellectuals (and nostalgic of the NV at that!)
